wow... I feel so out of the loop!
Trying to catch up with >1wk's worth of posts. And sorry peeps, but if you posted more than three, I didn't read them, b/c I can never get the >10/<10 arrows to work right without clicking/loading like 4 pages.

But so much happened...

Drove home in the shitty ice storm.

Went to an amazing funeral for an amazing man. Standing room only (in fact, overflow in another building, with an audio feed but no video, so they just sat in folding chairs and listened?), not a dry eye in the house. Somehow we got "VIP" seats. :/
Lovely, lovely eulogies.

super bowl-- sad, sad, sad.
But I liked the baby etrade ads.
But no one posted here about it?!

then we left for vacation.
More on that later. but some highlights- well there were 8 people on the boat, not 5 like I was expected. A 56' sailboat is a big boat, but for eight people to live on for a week- it gets tight. But the captain (i.e. kid the owners hire to do maintenance etc while they're not there) turned out to be a kid from the next town over, who knows my bro. small world.
But the food was awesome. Leave it to the former owners of an amazing restaurant to be able to whip up salmon with chipotle cream sauce and fresh mango salsa, and curried grouper with a variety of fresh chutneys-- in the galley of a boat.

mardi gras... sad I missed it.
But the boat's owners' daughter and her husband were on the trip- and they live in NOLA so that gave me some mardi gras spirit.
And timika- she works for an organization that is helping rebuild houses in the Tremaine district post-katrina-- and their funding is a 2.5 mil grant from Qatar! It was funny hear her talking about it expecting no one to know about it, and I was like "actually my friend lives there"

super tues- I'm not registered so i couldn't vote anyway, so I'm ok to tune that out. Frankly I don't want to think about the election until about october.

On the flight home it was brilliantly clear, and the view of the NYC skyline was breathtaking. And I never knew that it only takes 25 min from the time we fly over manhattan to the time we were at the gate in providence.

And last night seeing a friend's (from work) facebook status- "xx is: saving lives, one hockey player at a time" and hearing about the Zednick injury- YIKES. And then seeing people I work with on a big ESPN press conference was kind of cool.

and now I'm back... went from 82 degree weather to 12 degrees in a matter of hours- boo.
My brother was at the airport waiting for us with winter coats and a cooler full of soda. And glasses. What a good kid, esp considering that we went on vacation without him. And the house was painted (interior) while we were gone. wow.
And I'm barely tan, which is a bummer. It will probably be totally gone by the time I get back to buffalo (hopefully tomorrow, barring another miserable ice storm).

Now it's time to take a good long hot shower (showering on a boat, where you have to conserve fresh water, is a pain), try to catch up with email, do laundry, blah blah.

I wonder how long I'll feel the ground rocking. Sleeping in a real bed last night for the first time was interesting. It really felt like it was rocking all night. Still does. Typing this feels strange.

A couple pix from my phone that I tried to mobile-post while away-
(tons more coming once I'm settled back in b-lo and get them uploaded):


From the Bitter End Yacht Club, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands. (can't see our boat in the pic)


ZOMG!!
There is an IPOD VENDING MACHINE in the atlanta airport!!!!

these are almost timely...
(and once again, I can't thank (e:hodown) enough for introducing me to this site. :) )

I have been so fixated on getting this stupid test over with that it didn't dawn on me until now-

tomorrow is my last day at roswell, EVER!!

And we totally barely ever even had lunch!!

---

I hate this test, and I am going to do shitty (shittily?) on it.
Boo.

And I miss Dan.
Even more than I thought I would.

But, he comes back saturday.

And just to be shmoopy for a second (bear with me, I don't do this often)-

He sent me a card that is (I think) cute/funny.
On the front it has two frogs (random) and it says:

Life is so busy
If I could have
five extra minutes
each day..

[and inside]

I'd make out with you
like crazy
for five minutes

hahaha.
(and I won't tell you what he wrote b/c it's even more sickeningly cute.)

Sometimes I can't believe the cards they actually sell out there. I mean a card about making out? with frogs on it? how random!

Ok, back to procrastinating studying.

...but OH what a drive.
I'd heard it was supposed to be snowing in Buffalo as I left... I wasn't too worried. I walked out of my house to a driveway that was a sheet of ice... I probably should have taken that as a sign, and said 'sorry mom, I know there's a funeral, but I'm not driving in this.'
but oh no, I had to be a tough guy.
So, I got the GPS going. it said 404 miles, and estimated it would take 8 hours. Last time I did it in under 7, and being my usual competitive self, I wanted to beat that time this time.
Note: last time the roads were dry.
So I make my way to the 90, and GPS pipes up "go 272 miles, then bear right"
So I'm driving along. It's rainy and nasty, and occasionally I feel one wheel slipping a little. But I'm not scared. I'm tough.
I hit rochester at exactly 1 hour. Syracuse at exactly 2. Stop at the big rest stop right past syracuse, and when I got out of the car I realized that it was not just rain, but ice. My entire car was covered in a sheet of ice.
I got back on the road and kept plugging along. Called everyone to check in and say things were going fine.
All the while those monster plows are everywhere, and there are spun-out cars off the side of the road ALL OVER THE PLACE.
And then the thermometer in my car went from 33 to 31- and OH what a difference it made.
All of the sudden it was not rain, it was slush/snow.
It was so slippery. Not like ice, but still scary.
And then my wipers were all frozen so they only made contact in one little corner and I could barely see at all. But I didn't want to stop b/c I just wanted to get there and be done. not to mention I didn't want to get out of the car in that mess.
After a few TERRIFYING moments (giant trucks passing me at like 85mph spraying slush everywhere, so I couldn't see ANYTHING, while going around a curve with minimal traction, etc) I finally had the bright idea to BLAST the heat at max, which finally thawed out the wipers. and made me so hot I was tempted to drive around topless. HA.
Then about 50 miles past syracuse or so, the temp went back above freezing, and just like that the ice was gone and then it was just nasty rain the rest of the way. I hit the 272mile mark (Albany) in 3 1/2 hours or so, and I thought "wow! 404-272 -> ~125 I'm more than halfway there! no way is this going to take 8 hours! yahoo!"
Then checked a different screen- 220 left to go.
So I'm not sure where that 404 came from, but that was a huge downer.
And it did indeed take me all 8 hours. Which I seem to take as some sort of a failure, which is stupid. it was called "not dying"

But wow.
I like driving fast.
But this made me realize- I like driving fast when I have control of my car. Not when there are huge trucks bearing down on me and flashing their lights and I am afraid I'm about to go off the road.

I guess I didn't realize how tense and scared I was- but now my whole body is sore all over.

YUCK.

But, I made it home safe and sound.
Rocked out on Guitar Hero with my brother, had some quality time with the dog, and have already been fed about a week's worth of food.

Ahh, gotta love visiting the fam. :)

Hope you are all staying warm. I'll be back next week.

p.s. if any mac people are still reading- have you tried "back to my mac"? it's pretty amazing! I'm in RI but using my computer in buffalo via screen sharing. But I have access to everything! A little slow, but still- tres cool.

I know, I know, a sports post from Jenks? I don't believe it either...

I went to the Sabres game last night.
They won 10-1. Finally (I think if they'd lost it would have been the 10th loss in a row or something). Against the Atlanta Thrashers, who we thought should maybe change their name to the Atlanta Thrashed. Or Thrashees.

Dan says that "hockey-wise" it was a boring game. But, I thought it was pretty exciting b/c everyone got all into it b/c they JUST KEPT SCORING.
The best part though was the little 9 year old girl next to me. She was there with her grandpa (which is about the cutest thing ever) and she was cheering like crazy. And then Stafford got a hat trick, so everyone started throwing their hats onto the ice. But someone from the upper levels threw a hat that didn't quite made it to the ice, and landed in our laps. The girl was wondering if she could keep it, and I explained that people were throwing them on the ice b/c it was a hat trick. And she said "well do they get them back?" and I said I didn't think so, and she said "well that's a waste of money!"
haha
and the other best part was the huge fight at the end- and one guy got (if I remember it right)
2 minutes for roughing
2 minute for instigating
5 min for fighting
10 min for something else
and a whole game for disorderly conduct or something like that.
And another atlanta guy got a penalty too, and somehow buffalo got no penalty, so it was 5 on 3 for a while, and almost went to 5 on 2.

But don't worry peeps. I'm not turning into a hockey freak. Like this guy.
(have you seen this commercial? it's awesome)


And for the soccer/football people-
This is pretty funny. Well at least the first 2 min or so, then it turns to rubgy and it gets a little long.



So... my stupid exam is saturday.
I can not WAIT til it is over, so I can get back to a normal life.
And vacation in two weeks! woohooooooo!
Dan just left for aruba this AM.
I am super-jealous.

And- I finally got my applications in, and apparently not too late, b/c I mailed them out tuesday night, and by friday had 3 interview invites! woot woot. UB, Stony Brook, and UMass. So we'll see.

Now time to procrastinate a little more before I transform into study-monster.